EWDS
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  • COMPETITIONS
    • 2023-24 Trophy Winners >
      • Richard Holland Cup Winning Entry
      • Harry Craven Cup Winning Entry
      • President's Cup Winning Entry
      • T' Kissin' Shuttle Winning Entry
    • 2022 - 23 Trophy Winners
    • 2022 - 23 Winners' Photo Gallery
    • 2020 - 21 Trophy Winners
    • 2020 - 21 Winners' Photo Gallery
    • 2020 - 21 Winning Entries blank >
      • ODE TO A COTTON REEL - Sally James
      • ABSENT FRIENDS - NODDLE YED'S TALE - Betty Lightfoot
      • PiICKING COAL WITH DAD - Sally James
      • NIGHT SHIFT - Neville Southern
      • Frank Gibson's entry not published
    • 2019 Winning Entries >
      • A LUVIN’ ‘USBANT’S TREAT - Ron Williams
      • MOLLIE'S MEANDERINGS - Sally James
      • BLOOD BROTHERS - Sally James
      • THE OLD MILL STREAM - Sally James
      • Frank Gibson's entry not published
  • Edwin Waugh
    • Brief Biography
    • Waugh's Poems >
      • Poems and Songs Vol 1 1889
      • Posies From a Country Garden
      • More Poems and Songs - Full Length Book
      • Miscellany
    • Waugh's letters to his publisher
    • Other Waugh's letters
  • Waugh's Well
    • WAUGH'S WELL WALK
    • Videos and Gallery - 2021 Walk
    • Gallery - 2018 Walk
    • Gallery - 2017 Walk
    • Early Waugh's Well Photos
  • OUTSIDE EVENTS
    • 2018 Bolton Station Promotion >
      • Gallery - Bolton Station Stall
      • Video - Sid Calderbank with his Bones
      • Video - Come Whoam to thi' Childer an' Me
    • 2017 Nov 24 Edwin Waugh Tribute Night >
      • Edwin Waugh Tribute Night - Video of the whole performance
      • Videos of the Individual Songs from the evening >
        • Lift On The Way
        • Com Whoam t' thi' Childer and Me
        • Bide On
        • When The Sun Goes Down
    • 2017 National Dialect Festival >
      • Video - Sid Calderbank recites poem
  • SALES

Events Calendar
​2023 – 2024

2023

October 10th
PRESIDENT’S NEET 
​
June Schofield
Picture
​All the Presidents - Ladies and  Men
On this evening, we will remember  all our previous Presidents by reflecting on their contributions to the Society and by reading their favourite dialect poems and stories.
November 14th
"Off the Cuff"
​Presented by
​Clare McKee
​​Performance Poet, Artist, Digital Artist
Picture
Clare wrote in verse when taking a sabbatical from a long and varied career in nursing, including 14 years in the NHS in Rochdale. She subsequently became known as a performance or spoken word poet. 
​
​
Her talk will draw on this early writing in a style that is spontaneous and extempore inviting the audience to participate or to challenge with words of their own choice.

She is especially pleased to speak/perform her work at EWDS as she never forgot the Lancashire dialect poem she learnt as a child from an elderly neighbour who had heard it recited by her four great uncles, one of whom had been an original Rochdale Pioneer.

Clare will offer some of her art work as cards in limited editions with proceeds to EWDS.

December 12th
"A Merry Yuletide"   Kesmas Party
Picture
On  this evening, members are invited to present their favourite dialect item with a Christmas theme, be it a poem, story or song.
​​In the Chair
June Schofield
​​In the Chair
Jim Saville
​​​In the Chair
Alison Cooper

2024

January 9th
"Lancashire - A Lost Heritage"
​
Dr Paul Salveson MBE
Picture
Paul is a writer and historian, mostly covering aspects of Lancashire history and culture. His new book 'Lancastrians: Mills, Mines and Minarets' (Hurst &Co. 2023) explores Lancashire identity - past, present and future - and asks if there could be an opportunity for a 'Greater Lancastria' which restores at least some of the historic county.


In the Chair
Dave WOOD​​
​​February 13th
 Lancashire Folk Night
Poetry and Song
​

Picture



​
​

​In the Chair

Jim Saville
​​March 12th
Annual Suppering-Do
​Edwin Waugh’s Birthday Celebration

and Trophy Presentation Evening

​​More details of
​the supper here.
Picture
Trophies Presented by
Stewart Chadwick


​

​
​In the Chair

Stewart Chadwick

April 9th
7:00pm 
Annual General Meeting

​
​
​7:30pm   approx
 "A Neet wi' Sam Fitton o' Shay"
presented by Alyson Brailsford
Picture
Sam Fitton originally worked in the local cotton mills but he went on to make a living as a skilled illustrator & cartoonist, poet, dialect writer and performer. 

A number of his verses - 'Eawr Sarah's Getten a Chap' and 'My Owd Case Clock' - became standards in the dialect repertoire.

​Fitton was also a marvellous mimic and comic entertainer. He was above all a Lancashire man with a Lancashire view of the world, or as one of his friends described him, 'a gradely man with a gradely sense of humour'.


​

​In the Chair
John Pye
 May 14th
"Lancashire and its Cotton Industry"
songs by Mark Dowding
​
Mark developed an interest in the songs of Lancashire in his schooldays by listening to Harry Boardman singing on various LPs. Mark eventually found himself at Harry’s folk club in Manchester for a few years and the banjo that Mark plays is one of Harry’s.
Picture
Mark Dowding will be singing songs of the cotton industry from three aspects - Songs written by writers who were involved in the Victorian period, songs written by writers in the 1960s looking back at the Victorian period and the decline of the cotton industry and to conclude, songs written about Lancashire by writers who probably never set foot in Lancashire or a cotton shed!
In the Chair
Marilyn Moore
June 11th
"Tom's 'Crinkum-crankum' Crankies"
presented by Tom Byrne
​


​

​
Picture

Join performer and artist Thomas Byrne as he showcases some of crankie theatre scrolls.
​Tom was kindly funded by the Arts Council to research this fascinating art form which involves a performer using a hand cranked, illustrated scroll to tell stories, sing songs, or recite poetry.

Tom will also be talking about his introduction to the Lancashire dialect and how he’s now incorporating dialect into his crankie work…

​The term ‘crinkum-crankums’ was discovered in a glossary of the dialect by W.E.A.Axon and means ‘odds and ends/curiosities’ so prepare yourself for something odd, curious, and hopefully entertaining!

​

​In the Chair
Alyson Brailsford

Special Summer Weekend Gathering


Saturday August 3rd
Walk to Waugh's `Well
​Starting at 11:00am
A new notice board has been made to replace the now dilapidated one at Fo' Edge Farm. On this walk we will be taking the new board and replacing the old one with it.

Please come and join us.
​We will read some Edwin Waugh poems on the way, too!

Picture
More details can be found on our
​Waugh's Well Walk page 

Sunday August 4th
 1:00 pm
Lunch at "The Regal Moon", Wetherspoons, Rochdale, 
OL16 1HB



​2:30 pm
​Meet at the Dialect Writers' Monument in Broadfield Park, Rochdale
for readings, poems and songs​

​

3:00 pm
followed by 
a conducted tour of the newly refurbished
​Rochdale Town Hall

Rochdale Town Hall Photos

Picture
Monument stands in Broadfield Park, Rochdale, Lancashire.
​The pictured face, one of four, is dedicated to Edwin Waugh.

Upper inscription reads:
Edwin Waugh Born Rochdale, 27th Jan'y 1817 Died New Brighton, 30th April 1890 "Come whoam to thi childer an me"
Lower inscription reads:
In grateful memory of four Rochdale writers of the Lancashire dialect who have preserved for our children, in verse and prose that will not die, the strength and tenderness, the gravity and humours of the fold of our day, in the tongue and talk of the people.
This memorial was erected A.D. 1900.

The other faces are dedicated to Oliver Ormerod, Margaret Rebecca Lahee, and John Trafford Clegg.
Read more about it on  Dr Tony Shaw's blogspot​
  • HOME
  • LATEST NEWS
  • Calendar
    • EVENTS 2024-25
  • ABOUT US
    • HOW TO FIND US
    • HOW TO JOIN
    • WAUGH'S BIRTHDAY SUPPER
    • COMMITTEE
    • OUR CONSTITUTION
    • SPEAKER SERVICES
    • CONTACT US
  • COMPETITIONS
    • 2023-24 Trophy Winners >
      • Richard Holland Cup Winning Entry
      • Harry Craven Cup Winning Entry
      • President's Cup Winning Entry
      • T' Kissin' Shuttle Winning Entry
    • 2022 - 23 Trophy Winners
    • 2022 - 23 Winners' Photo Gallery
    • 2020 - 21 Trophy Winners
    • 2020 - 21 Winners' Photo Gallery
    • 2020 - 21 Winning Entries blank >
      • ODE TO A COTTON REEL - Sally James
      • ABSENT FRIENDS - NODDLE YED'S TALE - Betty Lightfoot
      • PiICKING COAL WITH DAD - Sally James
      • NIGHT SHIFT - Neville Southern
      • Frank Gibson's entry not published
    • 2019 Winning Entries >
      • A LUVIN’ ‘USBANT’S TREAT - Ron Williams
      • MOLLIE'S MEANDERINGS - Sally James
      • BLOOD BROTHERS - Sally James
      • THE OLD MILL STREAM - Sally James
      • Frank Gibson's entry not published
  • Edwin Waugh
    • Brief Biography
    • Waugh's Poems >
      • Poems and Songs Vol 1 1889
      • Posies From a Country Garden
      • More Poems and Songs - Full Length Book
      • Miscellany
    • Waugh's letters to his publisher
    • Other Waugh's letters
  • Waugh's Well
    • WAUGH'S WELL WALK
    • Videos and Gallery - 2021 Walk
    • Gallery - 2018 Walk
    • Gallery - 2017 Walk
    • Early Waugh's Well Photos
  • OUTSIDE EVENTS
    • 2018 Bolton Station Promotion >
      • Gallery - Bolton Station Stall
      • Video - Sid Calderbank with his Bones
      • Video - Come Whoam to thi' Childer an' Me
    • 2017 Nov 24 Edwin Waugh Tribute Night >
      • Edwin Waugh Tribute Night - Video of the whole performance
      • Videos of the Individual Songs from the evening >
        • Lift On The Way
        • Com Whoam t' thi' Childer and Me
        • Bide On
        • When The Sun Goes Down
    • 2017 National Dialect Festival >
      • Video - Sid Calderbank recites poem
  • SALES